Employee activism challenges HR's employee experience strategy

Employees aren't afraid to challenge their employers on workplace and social issues. That kind of employee activism may challenge HR to rethink its employee experience strategy.

Employees are increasingly demanding a higher standard of conduct from their employers. They are going public to drive change, which could put pressure on HR departments to improve their employee experience strategy.

Three recent high-profile protests illustrate this change in workplace attitude. Last month, employees at home goods retailer Wayfair protested a furniture order to a migrant detention center. In May, some 7,600 Amazon employees signed a letter pressing for action on climate change. Last fall, about 20,000 Google workers protested the company's response to sexual harassment. Google employees didn't stop there: In May, they staged office sit-ins to protest alleged retaliation against some employee protestors.

The protests illustrate what experts see as a cultural shift in the workplace. The change is partly generational, said Martha Bird, lead anthropologist at HR software and services provider ADP LLC, based in Roseland, N.J. It comes from people who were raised to believe "that they had the capacity as individuals to actually affect change," she said.

But how the company manages such change may fall to HR leaders. Understanding and measuring employee attitudes is part of HR's employee experience strategy. The risk for firms can be deeper than just a public protest. Experts see a direct link between employee hiring and retention.

Values linked to retention Forrester Research, in a forthcoming employee experience survey, linked corporate values to retention. It found 87% of employees who agree with their company values are likely to stay with their employer, said Anjali Lai, an analyst at Forrester. That's compared with 76% for the average employee. The data comes from a global survey of more than 13,000 workers.

Wayfair employees protest sale of beds to migrant detention centers for children.SCOTT EISEN/GETTY IMAGES A participant of the Wayfair walkout holds a sign in Copley Square on June 26, 2019, in Boston. Wayfair sold more than $200,000 in bedroom furniture to a Texas detention facility for migrant children. Alignment in values pays off in productivity, as well, Lai said. The survey found 85% of today's employees who agree with company values say they're very productive at work, compared with the benchmark average of 72%.

"Consumers are increasingly demanding to do business with companies that stand for certain social, moral, political values that the customers agree with," Lai said. These consumers demand the same standards of their employers. "Values-driven consumers are also employees," she said.

Prospective employees are taking a similar tact. They are interested in a firm's values, as well as the job itself, as they look for the "right fit for themselves," Bird said.

"They're really interviewing the potential employer as much as they're being interviewed or maybe even perhaps more," Bird said.

HR may be falling short The employee experience strategy has become an increasing HR focus. But Deloitte, in its recent annual report on human capital trends, said employee experience often "falls short" in understanding what workers want. It argued that employees want "to connect work back to the impact it has on not only the organization, but society as a whole."

HR's employee experience strategy typically highlights improving processes, such as onboarding. Bad onboarding processes have been linked to retention problems. The strategy may also include more frequent surveys, sometimes as often as once a quarter, to track employee sentiment and engagement.

"I think it's important for employers to see what their employees are posting [on public social media] and not necessarily in a nefarious way," said Michael Elkins, a labor and employment attorney at MLE Law, based in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. "You should know who you're working with, know what they like, what they don't like."

Elkins, who counsels employers on how to prevent employee claims, said a firm's culture is important.

"Modern technology has given employees easy access to the behavior of companies," Elkins said. "Whether one agrees or disagrees" with a particular protest action, "the fact is employees know they're able to garner attention for causes," he said. They'll try to "effectuate change."

Employees are also consumers "You almost have to think of your employees like they're consumers," said Greg Barnett, senior vice president of science at Predictive Index, a behavioral and cognitive assessment firm in Westwood, Mass. If consumers perceive a misstep by a firm, it may generate a social media backlash. Something similar is happening with employees, and "this is the new normal," he said.

“Work and life are becoming more blended” has several causes. One is the expectation that you’re on call all the time in many professional roles. Your boss didn’t care what you did after work nearly as much until they had to listen to your personal reasons for not being on call from 6-8 PM. I once had to argue that it was unreasonable to demand that I work 2-6 AM on Mother’s Day supporting a software migration. My boss’ response, what do you care, you don’t talk to your mother? My reply: my kids are celebrating with ME, and they’re seeing the other one. I ended up working 4-8 AM in support and deciding I’d be working somewhere else.

Another is companies saying “bring your whole self to work!” in an attempt to increase morale, encourage group loyalty ... and then trying to mediate problems because people are arguing over religion, politics and other things we used to say NOT to bring to work. They solve this using the social justice hierarchy. The Muslim can talk about how great their faith is at a company luncheon and invite people to their mosque, but mention the positive aspects of Christianity, and you’re shut down if not outright reprimanded.

Companies are also increasingly injecting politics into the workplace. Human Resources often gives ethics training that can be summarized as “liberal = good, social justice = justice/fair, so you can’t question social justice or you’re in violation of company ethics policy”.

I have seen “trust and respect” seminars telling people not to make assumptions, but don’t do anything that might offend stereotypical groups. So don’t assume Asians are good at math and let’s put black lesbian engineers front and center in the seminar on purpose, but we can bash whites and men in general because they’re all oppressors. So you can’t put the white guy on the cover of the company newsletter unless he won a major award, is homosexual, or a disabled vet.

Things got worse under the Obama administration using the Out and Equal Index and other far-left political groups’ checklists as determining factors in who to give contracts to. Now the company was intentionally attracting LGBT employees and saying we had to accommodate them, shut up bigots if you don’t agree with the dude in a pink pantsuit sharing the bathroom or changing room. When I reported his sexual harassment of me, I was written up for abuse of the sexual abuse hotline ... it was “a dispute between two women”. I called him “it” or his name. I was reprimanded for that. I went to farther bathrooms in the building to protect my privacy, he’d follow me, trap me in stalls and scream at me as a bigot. A 6’ plus man waiting for me in the bathroom, physically intimidating me, in addition to interrupting meals to tell me about a bleeding neo-vagina being similar to someone having a period and tracking MY period.

And again, I was the one repeatedly reprimanded and punished for saying this was unacceptable behavior. I was told by my boss and his boss to just shut up, go along, can’t you go out for drinks with him? I said it was inappropriate to go out with other men because I’m married, with children. Then got another reprimand for saying he’s a man. I replied he fathered a son. “But that was before.”

With Obgerfell, the company had parties to celebrate the ruling. And I was abused for not attending what were parties to celebrate a political decision. No one was ordering anybody to go to Christmas parties.

I left soon after. I now work with much saner people. I took a pay cut to do it. I also stayed out of ALL defense positions, though I was offered them, because those cultures were too damn toxic. Trump’s win did not reverse six years of social justice infection and the years of social engineering in the workplace. Not when all four of the big companies were mandating diversity statements as part of your performance review and bragging about higher attrition rates of whites and men as a great opportunity for POC. Note - I’m not a white man.

Sitting through political correctness lectures were a torture in and of themselves. That’s what connected me to Doctor Jordan Peterson.

Compulsory Political Education: A Real World Case Study at the U of Toronto
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-7YGGCE9es

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